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The implicit association test (IAT) measures automatic associations. In the present research, the IAT was adapted to measure implicit attitudes toward technological hazards. In Study 1, implicit and explicit attitudes toward nuclear power were examined. Implicit measures (i.e., the IAT) revealed negative attitudes toward nuclear power that were not detected by explicit measures (i.e., a questionnaire). In Study 2, implicit attitudes toward EMF (electro‐magnetic field) hazards were examined. Results showed that cell phone base stations and power lines are judged to be similarly risky and, further, that base stations are more closely related to risk concepts than home appliances are. No differences between experts and lay people were observed. Results of the present studies are in line with the affect heuristic proposed by Slovic and colleagues. Affect seems to be an important factor in risk perception.

Results of past research suggest that affect plays an important role in risk perception. Because affect may also increase the availability of risks, affect and availability are closely related concepts. Three studies tested the hypothesis that evoking negative affect (fear), either through past experience or through experimental manipulation, results in greater perceived risk. The present research focused on perception of flooding risk. Study 1 and Study 2 showed that participants who received risk information concerning a longer time period (e.g., 30 years) perceived more danger compared with participants who received risk information for one year. Study 2 showed that the interpretation of risk information was influenced by participants' own experiences with flooding. In Study 3, affect was experimentally manipulated. After looking at photographs depicting houses in a flooded region, participants perceived greater risk compared with participants in a control group. Taken together, the results of these three studies suggest that affect is important for successful risk communication. Results of the present research are in line with the affect heuristic proposed by Slovic and colleagues.

This study draws a nexus between heuristic-systematic information processing and the theory of planned behavior through a model of risk information seeking and processing. The model proposes that the form of information processing individuals apply to risk information from the media and other sources affects beliefs, evaluations, and attitudes considered important to making judgments about performing risk-reducing behaviors. This study found that deeper, more systematic processing of risk information is positively related to evaluation strength, attitude strength, and the number of strongly held behavioral beliefs actively considered by respondents when thinking about environmental hazards. The relationships were consistent, appearing across two communities and three risks (two health risks and one ecological risk), and held up under multiple statistical controls.

The semantics of left and right provide an efficient heuristic to understand and organize political information. Most studies on the left—right schema have focused on established democracies, but the anchoring function that it serves for party systems may be particularly relevant in new democracies where partisanship has not taken root. This article investigates the heuristic value of left and right in East Asian democracies by examining survey data from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines. Data from Australia and New Zealand are also included for comparative purposes. These countries offer useful contrasts for hypotheses testing because they cover a wide range of democratic experiences and party-system stabilization. The following questions will be addressed: (1) Are publics in East Asian democracies familiar with the left—right dimension? (2) Can the publics locate the positions of political parties and consistently rank them on the left—right spectrum? (3) To what extent do the publics' left—right self-placements affect their party preference? Left— right cognition, consistency of party rankings, and correlations between self-placements and attitudes toward parties for each of the six cases are presented and discussed in detail. Similarities and differences between older and newer democracies in patterns of cognition and party ranking are also discussed.

An experiment was designed to examine the role of emotion in persuasion. In this study, 140 undergraduates viewed eight public service announcements (PSAs) and then reported on their cognitive, emotional, and attitudinal responses to each. Some participants were instructed to attend to their feelings and use them in evaluating the PSAs (heuristic-enabled condition), whereas others were told to dampen their feelings and not let their emotions influence their judgments of the PSAs (heuristic-disabled condition). After controlling for cognition, the data showed a unique and separate effect for each emotion on perceived message effectiveness. However, the manipulations produced no observable effect on the magnitude of association between emotion and perceived effectiveness. Effects of both emotion and cognition on attitude toward the issue were mediated by perceived message effectiveness. A second study showed that perceived effectiveness and liking for the message are distinct judgments. Effectiveness is the preferred measure for studying PSAs.

Following up on recent debates about sectoral systems of innovation and production, the paper introduces a heuristic framework for analyzing and explaining distinct patterns of technology-based sectoral change. The concept is based on two interrelated influencing factors. The first is the sectoral-specific transformative capacity of new technologies themselves, that is, their substantial or incremental impact on socioeconomic and institutional change in a given sectoral system. The second is the sectoral adaptability of socioeconomic structures, institutions, and actors confronted with the opportunities presented by new technologies. The first factor the sectoral transformative capacity of new technologies enables us to identify the technology-driven pressure to change and adjust the structural and institutional architectures of the sectoral system. The second, complementary factor sectoral adaptability helps us to discern the distinct social patterns of anticipating and absorbing this technology-based pressure. The specific interplay between the two influencing factors creates distinguishable modes of sectoral transformation, ranging from anticipative and smooth adjustments to reactive and crisis-ridden patterns of change. Even processes of radical sectoral change continue over longer periods of mismatch, characterized by a cumulation of numerous and mostly gradual organizational, structural, and institutional transformations.

When applying the contingent valuation method (CVM) in risk reduction studies, some studies report that willingness to pay (WTP) is insensitive to the magnitude of risk reduction while other studies do not. On the other hand, social‐psychological research has shown that the affect heuristic biases judgments on probability, relative frequency, and risk. This article examines both magnitude (or scope) effect and affect heuristic (or representation) effect on WTP for risk reduction measures against tsunamis by introducing two experimental (i.e., absolute and relative) systems with four different representations to evaluate public behaviors in two different scenarios of risk reduction. Two common denominators (100 and 10,000) are introduced into absolute risk reduction representation (i.e., "of every 100 persons, from present 2 deaths to 1") to form different formats (i.e., "of every 10,000 persons from 200 to 100," and "of every 100,000 persons from 2,000 deaths to 1,000"). There is little evidence that WTP estimates are sufficiently sensitive to the magnitude of risk reduction, but relative risk reduction representations may be better than the absolute one given in CVM mail surveys when the risk is small. There is a statistically insignificant effect of risk reduction representations on respondent frequency, but mixed effects on the monetary values of WTP at the level of 0.05. The representation effect of absolute risk reduction on the WTP value varies with the common denominator. The larger the common denominator, the less the WTP to reduce the risk of tsunamis, and the significance probability is improved to less than the level of 0.05 when the common denominator becomes large enough. The findings suggest that improved methods are required for estimating the rates of tradeoff between fatality risk and other goods among consumers.

Although there is ample empirical evidence that trust in risk regulation is strongly related to the perception and acceptability of risk, it is less clear what the direction of this relationship is. This article explores the nature of the relationship, using three separate data sets on perceptions of genetically modified (GM) food among the British public. The article has two discrete but closely interrelated objectives. First, it compares two models of trust. More specifically, it investigates whether trust is the cause (causal chain account) or the consequence (associationist view) of the acceptability of GM food. Second, this study explores whether the affect heuristic can be applied to a wider number of risk‐relevant concepts than just perceived risk and benefit. The results suggest that, rather than a determinant, trust is an expression or indicator of the acceptability of GM food. In addition, and as predicted, "affect" accounts for a large portion of the variance between perceived risk, perceived benefit, trust in risk regulation, and acceptability. Overall, the results support the associationist view that specific risk judgments are driven by more general evaluative judgments The implications of these results for risk communication and policy are discussed.

After the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001 in U.S., the container security issue got high attention, especially by U.S. government, which deployed a lot of measures to promote or improve security systems. U.S. government not only enhances its national security system, but allies with other countries against the potential terrorist attacks in the future. For example CSI (Container Security Initiative), it encourages foreign ports outside U.S. to become CSI ports as a part of U.S. anti-terrorism network. Although promotion of the security could partly reach the goal of anti-terrorism, that will influence the efficiency of container supply chain, which is the main concern when implementing the inspection measurements. This paper proposes a quick estimation methodology for an inspection service rate by a berth allocation heuristic such that the inspection activities will not affect the original container supply chain. Theoretical and simulation results show this approach is effective.

Curvilinear models have been proposed to reflect the simultaneous consideration of both differences and similarities. We build on these models and propose a heuristic model of diversity and similarity curves based on supply and demand curves from economics. We use the curves to graphically show how changes in demographic differences (diversity) and value congruence (similarity) can affect the extent of competition/cooperation, which will subsequently affect the extent of creativity in an organization. We capture this graphically by flattening or steepening the slopes of the diversity and similarity curves. We conclude by discussing the advantages of using diversity and similarity curves and explore the implications for theory, research, and practice.

Information fusion is a research area which focuses on how to combine information from many different sources to support decision making. Commonly used information fusion systems are often complex and used in military and crises management domains. The focus of information fusion research so far has been mainly on the technological aspects. There is still a lack of understanding relevant user aspects that affect the information fusion systems as a whole. This paper presents a framework of HCI issues which considers users as embedded in the context of information fusion systems. The framework aims at providing insights regarding factors that affect user interaction to inform the development of future information fusion systems. Design considerations are presented together with a heuristic evaluation of an information fusion prototype.

Information fusion is a research area which focuses on how to combine information from many different sources to support decision making. Commonly used information fusion systems are often complex and used in military and crises management domains. The focus of information fusion research so far has been mainly on the technological aspects. There is still a lack of understanding relevant user aspects that affect the information fusion systems as a whole. This paper presents a framework of HCI issues which considers users as embedded in the context of information fusion systems. The framework aims at providing insights regarding factors that affect user interaction to inform the development of future information fusion systems. Design considerations are presented together with a heuristic evaluation of an information fusion prototype.